HPB-SB-1-5: Difference between revisions

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{{Style S-HPB SB. HPB note|Future Theosophy|center}}

{{Style S-HPB SB. HPB note|“H.P.B.”|center}}

{{Style S-HPB SB. HPB note|The storm raised by D^r G. Beard’s lies|center}}

{{Style S-HPB SB. HPB note|(HPB’s 1^st letter)|center}}

  | subtitle = A Second Ida Pfeiffer with the Eddys — Apparitions of Georgians, Persians, Kurds, Circassians, Africans, and Russians — What a Russian Lady Thinks of Dr. Beard.

  | untitled =  

  | source title = Daily Graphic, The

  | source details = vol. V, p. 873

  | original date =  

  | notes =  

  | categories =  

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Aware in the past of your love of justice and fair play, I most earnestly solicit the use of your columns to reply to an article of Dr. G. M. Beard in relation to the Eddy family in Vermont. He, in denouncing them and their spiritual manifestations in a most sweeping declaration, would aim a blow at the entire spiritual world of today. His letter appeared this morning (October 27). Dr. George M. Beard has for the last few weeks assumed the part of the “roaring lion” seeking for a medium “to devour.” It appears that today the learned gentleman is more hungry than ever. No wonder, after the failure he has experienced with Mr. Brown, the “mind-reader,” at New Haven.

Now to the Eddys. Dozens of visitors have remained there for weeks and even for months; not a single séance has taken place but some of them realized the personal presence of a friend, a relative, a mother, father, or dear departed child. But lo! here comes Dr. Beard, stops less than two days, applies his powerful electrical battery, under which the spirit does not even wink or flinch, closely examines the cabinet (in which he finds nothing), and then turns his back and declares most emphatically “that he wishes it to be perfectly understood that if his scientific name ever appears in connection with the Eddy family, it must be only to expose them as the greatest frauds who cannot do even good trickery.” “Consummatum est!” Spiritualism is defunct. “Requiescat in pace!” Dr. Beard has killed it with one word. Scatter ashes over your venerable but silly heads, oh Crookes, Wallace and Varley! Henceforth you must be considered as demented, psychologized, and lunatics, and so must it be with the many thousands of Spiritualists who have seen and talked with their friends and relatives departed, recognizing them at Moravia, at the Eddys’, and elsewhere throughout the length and breadth of this continent. But is there no escape from the horns of this dilemma? Yea, verily, Dr. Beard writes thus: “When your correspondent returns to New York I will teach him on any convenient evening to do all that the Eddys do.” Pray why should a Daily Graphic reporter be the only one selected by G. M. Beard, M.D., for initiation into the knowledge of so clever a “trick”? In such a case why not publicly denounce this universal trickery, and so benefit the whole world? But Dr. Beard seems to be as partial in his selections as he is clever in detecting said tricks. Didn’t the learned doctor say to Colonel Olcott while at the Eddys’ that three dollars’ worth of second-hand drapery would be enough for him to show how to materialize all the spirits that visit the Eddy homestead?

Let Dr. Beard rise and explain the following fact if he can: I remained fourteen days at the Eddys’. In that short period of time I saw and recognized fully out of 119 apparitions seven “{{Style S-HPB SB. HPB underlined|spirits}}”. I admit that I was the only one to recognize them, the rest of the audience not having been with me in my numerous travels throughout the East, but their various dresses and costumes were plainly seen and closely examined by all.

''Second''. A little old man appears. He is dressed as Persian merchants generally are. His dress is perfect as a national costume. Everything is in its right place, down to the “babouches” that are off his feet, he stepping out in his stockings. He speaks his name in a loud whisper. It is “Hassan Aga,” an old man whom I and my family have known for twenty years at Tiflis. He says, half in Georgian and half in Persian, that he has got a “big secret to tell me,” and comes at three different times, vainly seeking to finish his sentence.

''Fourth''. A Circassian comes out. I can imagine myself at Tiflis, so perfect is his costume of “nouker” (a man who either runs before or behind one on horseback). This one speaks. More, he corrects his name, which I pronounced wrongly on recognizing him, and when I repeat it he bows, smiling, and says in the purest guttural Tartar, which sounds so familiar to my ear, “Tchoch yachtchi” (all right), and goes away.

''Fifth''. An old woman appears with a Russian headgear. She comes out and addresses me in Russian, calling me by an endearing term that she used in my childhood. I recognize an old servant of my family, a nurse of my sister.

''Seventh and last''. A large grey-haired gentleman comes out attired in the conventional suit of black. The Russian decoration of Saint Ann hangs suspended by a large red moiré ribbon with two black stripes—a ribbon, as every Russian will know, belonging to said decoration. This ribbon is worn around his neck. I feel faint, for I think of recognizing my father. But the latter was a great deal taller. In my excitement I address him in English, and ask him: “Are you my father?” He shakes his head in the negative, and answers as plainly as any mortal man can speak, and in Russian, “No; I am your uncle.” The word “diadia” has been heard and remembered by all the audience. It means “uncle.”

{{Style P-Signature|H. P. Blavatsky.